The swelling coalition against the Stop Online Piracy Act gained three new members on Thursday night: Republican presidential candidates Mitt Romney, Newt Gingrich, and Rick Santorum. The fourth debate participant, Rep. Ron Paul (R-TX), is a long-time opponent of the legislation.

"What is your take on SOPA, and how do you believe it affects Americans," a user asked the candidates via Twitter.

"You're asking a conservative about the economic interests of Hollywood," said former Speaker Newt Gingrich. "On the other hand, you have virtually everybody who's technologically advanced, including Google, YouTube, and Facebook, and all the folks who say 'this is going to totally mess up the Internet, and the bill in its current form is written really badly, and leads to a range of censorship.'"

"I favor freedom," he said. "If a company finds that it has genuinely been infringed upon, it has the right to sue. But the idea that we're going to preemptively have the government start censoring the Internet on behalf of giant corporations' economic interests strikes me as exactly the wrong thing to do."

"I think he got it just about right," said former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney. "The law as written is far too intrusive, far too expansive, far too threatening to freedom of speech and movement of information across the Internet. It would have a potentially depressing impact on one of the fastest-growing industries in America.

"If we can find a way to very narrowly, through our current laws go after those people who are pirating, particularly those from offshore, we'll do that," Romney said. "But a very broad law which gives the government the power to start stepping into the Internet and say who can pass what to who, I think that's a mistake, so I'd say no, I'm standing for freedom."

Paul touted his long-standing opposition to the law. "I am pleased that the attitude has sort of mellowed up here, because the Republicans unfortunately have been on the wrong side of this issue," he said. "This bill is not going to pass, but watch out for the next one."

Former Senator Rick Santorum was the only one of the four candidates who had anything good to say about SOPA. While he says he is opposed to the legislation, he insisted that "the Internet is not a free zone where anybody can do anything they want to do. I'm for free but I'm not for people abusing the law, and that's what's happening right now."